ChikPapa Very disappointed :(

TeenzTen An action-packed slog

Plustown A lot of perfectly good film show their cards early, establish a unique premise and let the audience explore a topic at a leisurely pace, without much in terms of surprise. this film is not one of those films.

AshUnow This is a small, humorous movie in some ways, but it has a huge heart. What a nice experience.

Leofwine_draca Another feather in the cap for director Umberto Lenzi and star Tomas Milian, this ultra-slick crime flick is a fine example of the "polizia" genre at its paciest and most fun: what starts off looking like a silly comedy-action film like THE COP IN BLUE JEANS soon takes a darker turn and becomes more serious, ending up as a tough thriller with a high body count and lots of cheesy stunts. The hero role of Rambo is taken by Tomas Milian this time around (usually playing a crippled or sadistic villain in Lenzi films from the period) and it's a great part: Rambo (no relation to the Sly Stallone character - this one came first) is an unshaven, masked motorbike-riding outlaw who has a thing about justice prevailing and murdering bad guys. As he's not part of the law he instead works around it, taking on the criminal gangs himself and turning them against each other. What's funniest about this film is the almost total lack of police presence! Gangs tear up the city and kill each other and they're nowhere in sight. Rambo's motorbike is gazed at lovingly by Lenzi's camera and he takes every opportunity to show off the sleek chrome bodywork, especially in lots of cheesy bike-jumping stunts that punctuate the action.Rambo also knows his own unique brand of karate, meaning we get lots of demonstrations as he effortlessly beats up thugs in a pool hall and takes on a room of practising karate students! The film begins as Rambo visits the home of an old pal, who has joined a police group and insists that Rambo does the same. Being a good-natured chap he helps to capture a few saboteurs and minor criminals. After the characters have been introduced, Rambo's buddy ends up getting violently murdered when he's close to cracking a kidnapping case - hardly surprising, seeing as he is set up for murder ever since his first appearance. Rambo decides to follow in his pal's footsteps and finds himself involved with two criminal gangs, led by ageing crime boss Paterno and slimy villain Conti. At first he successfully turns the two gangs against each other, causing much bloodshed, but then they wise up and turn against him. A tide of retribution and revenge follows with casualties on all sides.Nearly every technical element of the film is perfect. Cinematography, stunts, pacing, action, chases and dialogue all slot in nicely to the story. The only thing lacking is the music, which is a little sub-par for a Lenzi flick and not snazzy enough. Once again Lenzi has assembled an accomplished team of actors (most of whom were working in films back-to-back for the director) for his cast. Supporting the ever-excellent Milian are the exquisitely slimy Luciano Catenacci as the villain Conti and good old Luciano Pigozzi as a thug. The experienced Ida Galli and Shirley Corrigan play minor female roles whilst the retired Mafia don Paterno is played by American import actor Joseph Cotten. All in all a nice mix who fit their roles perfectly.As well as the many pacy car and bike chases that speed through the film, there are a couple of shoot-outs which deserve note. The first is the attack on Conti's warehouse operation by Paterno's guys dressed as police. Lots of bloody machine-gun shootings and spraying bullet action ensues. For the film's under siege set-piece finale, there's a shoot-out in the grounds of a deserted house played out in the middle of the night to the light of a flare - a clever and original touch. Although not as sadistic as previous or later Lenzi films the film does have a few gruesome asides, like an innocent woman being beaten to death and a guy (regular scumbag Bruno Corazzari) literally overdosing on cocaine! These factors and more combine to make RAMBO'S REVENGE yet another quality genre contribution from Lenzi and a film to track down.

MARIO GAUCI One of the myriad "poliziotteschi" to emerge from Italy during the 1970s, to which both director Lenzi and star Tomas Milian contributed a good deal; in fact, their previous collaboration – ALMOST HUMAN (1974) – is considered among the genre high-points. This, however, is fairly indistinguishable – apart from the fact that the surname of Milian's character is Rambo!; it does include plenty of typical action, not to mention a funky score by Franco Micalizzi. Rambo is a reformed gangster who now supplies iconoclastic help to the Police; predictably, his best pal in the force (actually a special vigilante squad) ends up murdered before long – which sets Rambo on exacting private revenge. This sees him coming face to face once again with his former boss, a now-blind Joseph Cotten (who, like Milian, followed a certain code of ethics in spite of the nature of the work involved) whose 'empire' is being unscrupulously run by the old man's son, Alfredo Lastretti. A smaller rival band of criminals – among whose members is the ubiquitous Luciano Pigozzi – also gets into our disheveled hero's hair by kidnapping an eminent citizen (Silvano Tranquilli)'s son. Incidentally, this incongruous sentimental emphasis on kids – since Milian also dotes on his cop friend's idolizing offspring – does the film the biggest harm; at the same time, while keeping an affectionate (but platonic) eye on the latter boy's mum, he is romantically involved with a prostitute (Femi Benussi) – who, unsurprisingly, is eventually victimized by the baddies for it. Though consistently offering reasonable gratification of various sorts, most examples of the poliziottesco genre suffered from a shallowness that made them instantly forgettable – and this one, alas, proved no exception despite the involvement of two of its major exponents.

Witchfinder General 666 With films such as "Almost Human" (1974) and "Rome Armed to the Teeth" (1976) there is no doubt that Umberto Lenzi is (along with Fernando Di Leo) the absolute master of Italian crime cinema. And Tomas Milian, one of my personal favorite actors, is doubtlessly one of the greatest actors in Italian Cult-cinema in general. While "Il Giustiziere Sfida La Città" aka. "Syndicate Sadists" of 1975 is not nearly as memorable as their earlier collaboration, the nasty, brutal and downright brilliant "Milano Odia: La Polizia Non Può Sparare" aka. "Almost Human" of 1974, this is yet another bad-ass, action packed and incredibly entertaining Poliziottesco from the director/star team Lenzi/Milian.Funnily enough Milian plays a supremely bad-ass biker named 'Rambo', seven years before Vietnam vet Sylvester Stallone drew first blood in 1982. This Rambo is a super-cool full-bearded drifter with remarkable shooting- and fighting-skills, who comes back to his hometown Milan where a buddy wants to talk him into joining a security firm. When his buddy gets killed by gangsters, things get personal...Before becoming a major Poliziotteschi-star, Tomas Milian was already a star of Italian Westerns. The storyline of this film, in which the (anti-)hero plays two criminal gangs against each other, is derived from that of Sergio Leone's milestone "Per Un Pugno Di Dollari" ("A Fistful of Dollars", 1964), which itself was inspired by Akiro Kurosawa's masterpiece "Yojimbo" (1961). A similar storyline was used in several other Spaghetti Westerns, most notably Sergio Corbucci's "Django" (1966); With this film, Umberto Lenzi takes it to modern-day Milan. Even the film's score occasionally reminded me of (a funky 70s version of) Morricone's score to Leone's "Once Upon A Time In The West". "Il Giustiziere Sfida La Città" is neither quite as ultra-brutal and uncompromising, nor as essential a genre-entry as some of Lenzi's most memorable Poliziotteschi, "Almost Human", "Rome Armed to the Teeth" and also "Violent Naples", but it is definitely a highly entertaining film that lovers of Itlian Cult-cinema should not miss out on. The film is very well-shot, and full of violent shootouts, car chases, fights and the usual dose of enjoyable bad-assery. Tomas Milian is beyond cool, and the 70-year-old Joseph Cotten makes an excellent elderly crime boss. The rest of the cast includes many regulars, such as Luciano Catenacci, Guido Alberti, Luciano Pigozzi and Giuseppe Castellano. Rambo's girlfriend is played by sexy Femi Benussi, who sadly keeps her clothes on in this one. Overall, "Il Giustiziere Sfida La Città" is not one of Lenzi's masterpieces, but it is definitely a highly entertaining Poliziottesco that is especially recommendable for a supremely bad-ass Tomas Milian, and that shouldn't be missed by genre-fans.

bensonmum2 Tomas Milian is Rambo - a biker who arrives in Milan right in the middle of a war between two crime families. When his brother, a member of a kidnap investigation team, is killed, Rambo seeks revenge. He pits the two families against each other in hopes that they will destroy themselves so he can free the young boy being held for ransom.Syndicate Sadists was a blind purchase for me and I couldn't be more thrilled. This marks one of my first forays into the Italian sub-genre known as Polizia (or whatever the correct word is). And, I must say that I'm thrilled to have discovered these movies. If some of the others that I have on order (Contraband and Revolver) are half as good, I'll be delighted.I always have a good time watching Tomas Milian. He may come across as a conceited jerk in some of his interviews, but he has good reason. He never fails to entertain. His character, Rambo (please note that this movie was made long before First Blood), is one of my favorites. He's tough, compassionate, and mysterious.The action and gunplay are great. Between the gun fights and chase scenes, there is plenty of action to go around. One of my favorite scenes in the movie was the relatively calm showdown at the end between Rambo and the head of one of the families. Any movie that puts Milian and the scene-chewing Joseph Cotton together is a Euro-film lover's wet dream.If the brief description of the plot sounds familiar, don't be surprised. Once the movie got rolling, I said to myself on a number of occasions that it reminded me of A Fistful of Dollars. Imagine my surprise when my notion was confirmed while watching the interview with Lenzi on the DVD. He freely admitted that the story was inspired by Leone's film.